Faith is not about finding meaning in the world, there may be no such thing — faith is the belief in our capacity to create meaningful lives.
There is no one true church, no one chosen people.
How do we remain faithful to our own spiritual imagination and not betray what we know in our own bodies? The world is holy. We are holy. All life is holy.
I accept the Organic Trinity of Mineral, Vegetable, and Animal with as much authority as I accept the Holy Trinity. Both are sacred.
What is the most important thing one learns in school? Self-esteem, support, and friendship.
Word by word, the language of women so often begins with a whisper.
I am a woman with wings,’ I once wrote and will revise these words again. ‘I am a woman with wings dancing with other women with wings.’ In a voiced community, we all flourish.
The courage to continue before the face of despair is the recognition in those eyes of darkness we find our own night vision. Women blessed with death-eyes are fearless.
I wonder how it is we have come to this place in our society where art and nature are spoke in terms of what is optional, the pastime and concern of the elite?
Story is the umbilical cord that connects us to the past, present, and future. Family. Story is a relationship between the teller and the listener, a responsibility. . . . Story is an affirmation of our ties to one another.
What other species now require of us is our attention. Otherwise, we are entering a narrative of disappearing intelligences.
How we treat our land, how we build upon it, how we act toward our air and water, in the long run, will tell what kind of people we really are.-Laurance S. Rockefeller
Artifacts are alive. Each has a voice. They remind us what it means to be human – that it is our nature to survive, to create works of beauty to be resourceful, to be attentive to the world we live in.
When it comes to words, rather than using our own voice, authentic and unpracticed, we steal someone else’s to shield our fear.
It is not possible to satisfy women,” a friend said. “We are disturbed if we have children too young. Disturbed if we have then later. Disturbed if we don’t have children at all.
There are two important days in a woman’s life: the day she is born and the day she finds out why.
Women piece together their lives from the scraps left over for them.
Creativity involves breaking out of established patterns in order to look at things in a different way.
The danger is in what we codify, commodify, and exploit.
To withhold words is power. But to share our words with others, openly and honestly, is also power.
I pray to the birds because they remind me of what I love rather than what I fear. And at the end of my prayers, they teach me how to listen.
There is comfort in keeping what is sacred inside us not as a secret, but as a prayer.
Most of all, differences of opinion are opportunities for learning.
A shadow is never created in darkness. It is born of light. We can be blind to it and blinded by it. Our shadow asks us to look at what we don’t want to see
We are wearing coats of trust. When one tells a story this is what happens.
When I said, “I am my mother, but I’m not,” I was saying my path would be my own.
Buddha says there are two kinds of suffering: the kind that leads to more suffering and the kind that brings an end to suffering.
I have found what I need most to heal a broken bond is time together—the very thing I avoid is the thing most desired.
When silence is a choice, it is an unnerving presence. When silence is imposed, it is censorship.
the unexpected action of deep listening can create a space of transformation capable of shattering complacency and despair.
To write,” Marguerite Duras remarked, “is also not to speak. It is to keep silent. It is to howl noiselessly.
There is an art to writing, and it is not always disclosure. The act itself can be beautiful, revelatory, and private.
When I look in the mirror, I see a woman with secrets. When we don’t listen to our intuition, we abandon our souls. And we abandon our souls because we are afraid if we don’t, others will abandon us.
What is evolution if not creative adaptation and the progression of our own souls?
Choosing with integrity means finding ways to speak up that honor your reality, the reality of others, and your willingness to meet in the center of that large field. It’s hard sometimes.
Her body was rounded like earth. Stories. Breath. . . . Her eyes have been painted closed. I understand. To tell a story you must travel inward.
Listening over and over to the voices through a family of instruments allowed us to recognize and appreciate the dignity and uniqueness of each living thing in the meadow and forest.
If so, then it was also here where I came to know I can survive what hurts. I believed in my capacity to stand back up and run into the waves again and again, no matter the risk.
Here is the world. It is not a safe place, but however frightening and bewildering life may become, we can survive our fears, grab them by the wolf ’s tail as Peter did, and make peace with the world.
But harboring regrets is making love to the past, and there is no movement here.
WHAT ARE THE CONSEQUENCES when we go against our instincts? What are the consequences of not speaking out? What are the consequences of guilt, shame, and doubt?
Beauty is transformed over time, and not without destruction.
Water is nothing if not ingemination, an encore to the tenacity of life.
Each of us has one. Each voice is distinct and has something to say. Each voice deserves to be heard. But it requires the act of listening.
My voice is born repeatedly in the fields of uncertainty.
My grandmother simply shook her head and said, “You know what you saw. The bird doesn’t need to be counted, and neither do you.
Can you be inside and outside at the same time?I think this is where I live.I think this is where most women live.I know this is where writers live.Inside to write. Outside to glean.
A pencil is a wand and a weapon. Be careful. Protect yourself. It can be glorious.
Finding one’s voice is a process of finding one’s passion.
We know the quality of another’s heart through her voice.
Once you know that you have a voice,” Louis said, “it’s no longer the voice that matters, but what is behind the voice.
Your voice is the wildest thing you own,” Brooke says to me. “And you’re giving it away. You can’t see it. Your obsession is blinding you.” He is angry. He is talking in shorthand. “You’re losing yourself.
Faith is the centerpiece of a connected life. It allows us to live by the grace of invisible strands. It is a belief in a wisdom superior to our own. Faith becomes a teacher in the absence of fact.
I admire how she protects her energy and understands her limitations.